Photo of the Month: November 2008
Saturday, November 1st, 2008
The boy is growing and growing. It is quite simply amazing to see him do everything that he does. He is definitely not a mass of cells. He is a living breathing, sometimes crying, handful but so much fun. He is learning daily and with every new thing that he learns he remembers it and files it away. We love sometimes just watching him.
Having the boy here in China was something of a crazy situation for me. For my wife though… having the boy wasn’t so bad since she used to life here… But for me and for my family back in the states it was nerve-racking to hear about what was happening. Recently I found someone else who has gone through a similar situation with having a baby in China. Their story is different because they were up in Beijing and both foreigners, but the story of bureaucracy and the feelings of a new father and mother are all too familiar. One of the classic lines was this one when they had to go to the police station and register their “illegal baby”… the policeman asked them:
“Did you break the law intentionally or were you ignorant of it?”
So there it was. Are you a criminal or an idiot? Even I could see which way this one would cut, so I cast my lot with idiot.
“I had no idea.”
He grunted and finished the paperwork…
Just makes me laugh because I had a similar visit to the Entry/Exit bureau here in Shanghai. They were nasty to my wife, I think the guy woke up on the wrong side of the bed that morning, but they were nice as could be with me. It’s kind of hit or miss with these kind of places anywhere you go! After the initial visit I had to go back for further questions. I got the same guy who had been nasty to my wife. I guess that day he had also woken up on the wrong side of the bed. Too bad.
